


Circle of Accountability

by L1ttleSilkworm



Category: Chernobyl (TV 2019)
Genre: Boris comforting Valery, Boris is there for his Valera, Boris' POV, Brief strangling fantasy, Crying, Established Relationship, Hurt/Comfort, Implied/Referenced Rape/Non-con, M/M, Referenced intimate injury/sight of blood, Revenge, Valoris
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-03-18
Updated: 2020-03-18
Packaged: 2021-02-28 22:14:24
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 5,068
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/23124577
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/L1ttleSilkworm/pseuds/L1ttleSilkworm
Summary: When Valery becomes a victim of unspeakable cruelty, Boris is there to comfort and care for him while dealing with his own anguish and coming up with a plan for revenge.
Relationships: Valery Legasov/Boris Shcherbina
Comments: 20
Kudos: 63





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Content warnings: This is a hurt/comfort story concerning the aftermath of a rape, which happens off-screen, but there are references to it in the text. There is a brief erotic fantasy. There is a minor physical altercation between the characters. There is a brief homicidal (strangling) fantasy. There is a brief scene concerning an intimate injury, including the sight of blood. Characters are in a major emotional distress, including crying. 
> 
> My special gratitude to my dear friend @shark-from-the-park 💕 for beta reading, fixing my English and for the kind feedback and encouragement.
> 
> Please note that this work concerns strictly the characters created by Craig Mazin's imagination and by Jared Harris' and Stellan Skarsgard's inimitable acting talent, and categorically not the historical figures. If Valoris is not your thing, or if you disapprove of the topic choice, please refrain from hassling me about it. 18+ readers only please.

Deputy Chairman Boris Shcherbina checks his wristwatch, holding up a hand to shield the dial from the amber late afternoon sunlight that floods the salon of his Seagull. It is ten minutes before six on an unseasonably warm late March afternoon in Moscow, and the opulent government limousine is traveling down Volokolamskoye expressway to a small street west of the Kurchatov Institute in the Northwest of the city.

On the cream-colored leather seat by Boris’ side is a bag full of delicacies from an exclusive store for Kremlin officials. There are imported salamis and cheeses, Marlboro cigarettes, a bottle of French cognac and, most vitally, a large box of scrumptious “Napoleons” - best quality in town, flaky and airy, layered with delicious cream. Valery’s favorite.

Over the course of the eleven months Boris has known Valery Legasov for, he has become well acquainted with the man's eating habits. The humble scientist is perfectly content with subsisting on boiled potatoes and boiled chicken, yet he has a charming weakness for pastries and cakes. Boris made this unexpected discovery back in Pripyat’ when, one evening, desperate for a taste of anything that was not an army ration, he had scavenged a box of frozen cream puffs from a chest freezer in the abandoned hotel kitchen.

Boris will never forget how the scientist's weary face lit up suddenly at the sight of the pastries. How his eyes slid shut and a soft moan of pleasure escaped from his lips when he bit into a cold, creamy, chocolate-smothered goodness. How he sheepishly reached for a second. A third. Relishing, so purely, so gratefully, so fully, this unexpected refuge from the gelatinous horror that permeated every waking moment they spent in the dead city.

It was there and then that Boris knew with absolute certainty that he would spend whatever is left of his life loving Valery Legasov.

And now that they are back in Moscow for good, he cannot help indulging Valery’s sweet tooth any chance he gets.

Boris leans back in his seat with a pleasant shiver of anticipation as his mind wanders down a predictable arc from the scientist’s penchant for sweets to the wondrous softness of his body. He pictures Valery lying by his side in bed later tonight, all warm and limber and so prettily exhausted, head resting on Boris’ shoulder, plump thigh thrown casually over Boris' body.

A deluge of sudden desire is so fierce that it makes Boris involuntarily wince and grit his teeth. He checks his watch again in an effort to distract himself. It is two minutes before six, and the Seagull is, at last, pulling to a stop outside Valery's apartment building.

Out of the car in a snap, Boris crosses the street in large, confident strides, waving impertinently at the stopped traffic, the bag of groceries in his hand. Such gifts are sure to embarrass Valery, but behind all the frustrated huffing and “this was totally unnecessary”, and “this will look suspicious, Borya” and such, Boris knows that he will be pleased. Slowly but surely, the little ascetic is warming up to being cosseted by his lover.

He climbs the stairs to the second floor, and rings the bell for Valery's apartment.

Silence.

He presses the bell button again, longer now. Then, impatiently, for a third time.

He sets the bag on the floor and leans forward, pressing his ear to the door. Someone is playing _Alla Pugacheva_ in the neighboring apartment, her bright voice muffled by the thick padding. Boris presses the button one more time, then heads down the stairs, frowning. The Seagull is still outside, his driver waiting, as is customary between them, for fifteen extra minutes - should the plans change.

Boris trusts his driver, Oleg, more than any other soul in his work circle. And not only because of the man’s reliability, his salt-of-the-earth personality, or the fact that Oleg has been working for him for almost two decades. Some years back, Boris had returned to the Kremlin garage late one evening to retrieve a left-behind folder he was about to deliver to Andropov, and walked in on Oleg threading his fingers through the raven hair of a young car mechanic from Dagestan. The two men had stood to attention before the Deputy Chairman, their eyes large like jubilee coins. “Don’t get caught,” Boris said pointedly, and never mentioned the incident again.

Ever since, there has been an implicit understanding between the two men who have to hide whom they love.

Yet there was also another, more unsavory layer to their bond - Boris now knew a secret about Oleg. A tie forged out of such acknowledged vulnerability binds a man to another more strongly than shared experiences, or loyalty, or duty. In his long, extraordinary career, Boris had accumulated many such secrets that tied others to him - be it a regrettable confession from someone worse at holding their drink than Boris, or a strategically done favor of a gray-area variety, with strings attached, naturally. At times, lying awake at night, Boris could almost see these ties all around him, interlacing into something of a protective cocoon that kept him safe and afloat in the dangerous impermanence of his world. Forty-four years and counting.

“He is not at home,” Boris waves at Oleg’s questioning face as he opens the door of the Seagull. “Out for cigarettes, maybe.”

This doesn’t feel like a satisfying explanation at all. Something has happened. Valery is never late. If anything, he is always embarrassingly early to everything. Has he fallen asleep? Mixed up the dates in his absent-mindedness?

The thought leaves Boris feeling somewhat wounded. He has been counting the days since the last time they had a chance to be together. Two weeks to a day today. They can no longer do this often, now that they are back from Chernobyl for good. Not in this city, where every street light has eyes and ears. And now he has to sit here in his limousine like a spurned lover, watched by more than one curious pair of eyes, no doubt. He checks his watch. Six twenty.

Boris lowers his head and squints against the setting sun to pick out Valery’s windows on the second floor of the apartment building. He spots the grey silhouette of Sasha in the living room window, perched atop the window sill like a sentinel. Waiting for Valery, too.

Minutes pass by. “Any chance Valery Alekseyevich has fallen asleep, Boris Evdokimovich?” asks Oleg. Boris sighs and dials Valery’s number from the car phone, watching Sasha’s ears tilt back at the sound of the phone ringing in the empty apartment. No, he is not asleep. He is not at home and it is six forty-five. Something is very, very wrong.

He dials laboratory four at Kurchatov. “Valery Alekseyevich?” says the womans’ voice in the receiver. “He’s been out since four. He had a call from the…” the woman switches to a whisper. “The Deputy Director of the… Comrade Charkov, that is. Calling him in for a meeting about the RBMK redesign? Valery Alekseyevich was very excited, grabbed the blueprints and rushed right out of the door.”

Boris replaces the receiver, staring at it in bewilderment. A meeting about the RBMK redesign? Charkov had made it abundantly clear that no RBMK redesign will take place until after the trial is over when he had accosted Valery on the street earlier this month. And a sudden change of heart is certainly not in the KGB repertoire. And why didn’t Valery call _him_ about the meeting?

Cold sweat breaks out along Boris’ spine. _What if he doesn’t come back?_

_“We can make a deal with the KGB.”_

Boris silently curses his own words, uttered three months ago back in Pripyat’ in his desperate, half-baked attempt at deflecting Khomyuk’s insane plea for Valery’s martyrdom in Vienna. A plan that was only meant to keep Valery safe now hangs like a dead albatross around Boris’ neck. The sun has disappeared behind the apartment complex, and the sleepy street now looks grey and sinister. Sasha waits in the window, motionless. Twenty minutes past seven.

When, at last, Boris spots the beloved figure at the end of the street, he all but cries out in relief, having just enough sense to not jump out of the car and run towards Valery. Wouldn’t that be a satisfying sight for all the onlookers behind the curtains.

"I got him a nice briefcase and he is still carrying that ratty old one, look at him,” he grumbles to himself, his insides jumping up and down with glee. Valery is here, in the flesh, walking towards him, not locked away in a KGB cell. But as Valery gets closer, oblivious of the parked Seagull, Boris _knows_ that something is not right. Without being able to say what it is - _something about his posture? His face?_ \- he feels a pit of sadness suddenly opening up in him out of nowhere like a sinkhole.

He hurries out of the car, catching up with Valery just as the scientist is grabbing the handle of the front door.

"Valera, how- how did it go? What did Charkov say? Why didn't you call me?"

Valery blinks at Boris through his big glasses, his face looking strangely worn, exhausted even. He has a most peculiar expression on his face, eyebrows raised and brow furrowed, looking as if he is so sad for him, so, so sad for his Boris.

Dumbfounded, Boris follows Valery into the building and up the stairs. They both remain silent on the staircase - a prudent thing on the best of days, and certainly at this moment. But the second they are inside the apartment, Boris starts again.

“Tell me what happened!” he insists, his voice loud, breathy. “For God’s sake, tell me.”

“Nothing. It’s nothing, Borya.”

"Oh, don't give me ‘ _nothing_ ’"! What did he say? What did he call you in for? What else does he want? He’s got your testimony in Vienna, he is getting your testimony at the trial. What was it all about then? Why are you not telling me?!”

Without even realizing it, Boris is backing Valery into a small space between the coat rack and the bathroom door. He puts his hand on the door frame, trapping him further. Looming over him.

“Tell me!”

A flash of horror passes across Valery’s face.

“Valera,” Boris says quietly. “Why are you scared? What did he do?”

“It's nothing,” Valery says, sing-song like, looking somewhere sideways and up, his arms wrapping around himself in an involuntary hug. “Everything is the same. As it has been.”

“Valera.” Boris’ face is hot. He cannot take this. Fear and anger from not knowing are tearing through him like fire through a barn. "Why didn't you call me?”

“Because he told me you were already there!” cries out Valery, and darts under Boris’ arm in an attempt to escape. Purely by instinct, Boris grabs Valery around his waist, pulling him towards himself. Flailing his arms and furiously trying to kick back at Boris’ ankles, the younger man lets out a blood-curdling cry - Boris could not have even imagined that Valery could scream this loud -

“No-o-o!!! Not you, no, no, NO!!!”

Boris lets go of him at once, and Valery is propelled straight into the bathroom door. The cuffs of his shirt ride up momentarily, revealing fresh bruises on the pale skin of his wrists. Boris stumbles back into the coat rack in shock, just as Valery flings the bathroom door open and disappears inside. There is a sound of the lock clanking, then all falls terribly, terribly quiet.

Boris feels ill. He slides down the bathroom door, landing on the floor, his long legs reaching the opposite wall of the entry hallway of Valery’s tiny apartment. Cradles his head in his hands as the realization tears at his insides with its jagged edges.

He is feeling strangely as if he is hovering overhead somewhere - observing himself crumpled on the floor, doubled over with fresh pain, fresh guilt.

It had been just two weeks ago when Valery recounted to him the unnerving way in which he was accosted on the sidewalk by a surly agent and taken to a black Volga parked on a side street nearby. Oh God. Why hadn’t Boris been more alarmed at how out-of-bounds, out of any realm of normal that incident has been? Someone of Charkov’s rank does not just go around hounding people on the street. It is a purview of hundreds of thousands of dour agents with forgettable faces at the service of the Soviet Union. Oh no, this was no faithful governmental guard dog doing its job - but a wolf, a skilled predator to its core, stalking its prey.

Boris’ fists tighten at the thought, his upper lip curling under the pull of some primeval instinct. In a flash, he sees himself lunging across the Politburo table at the large bespectacled man. Gripping him by the neck. Crushing the sides of his throat. Watching him fight for his life, for one more breath of air. Maintaining the pressure.

There is rustling behind the door, then the sound of a shower running, and then... Boris turns his head toward the sound, sobs wracking his chest silently. Through the rush of running water, he listens to Valery softly weeping in the shower - the loneliest sound in the world.

(end of chapter 1)


	2. Chapter 2

Boris repositions himself so that his right side is pressed to the bathroom door, eyes fixed on a couple of millimeters of light seeping through the gap between the door and the door frame - close enough to feel the waft of warm steam on his skin. As if communing with Valery’s suffering. As if soaking up the sound of his crying could somehow blot the pain right out of him.

The shower runs for a long time, and when it stops, Boris is almost surprised by the push of the opening door as Valery tries to exit. He moves aside and watches wordlessly as the younger man emerges wrapped in two big towels, one on his hips and another around his shoulders, his face pink and puffy. He scurries into the bedroom, carrying his clothes in a bundle, and shuts the door behind him.

Desperate to occupy himself with something, Boris gets off the floor with some effort and goes to the kitchen. He fills the kettle and puts it on the stove. Focuses on the little tasks. Valery likes fresh hot tea.

Sasha comes out into the kitchen warily, inquiring, with a raspy meow, about her food bowl. Boris opens a package of salami from his preposterous grocery loot and throws half of its contents to the cat, the smell of food making his stomach turn. He opens the cognac and pours himself some. Shoots it as if it was vodka.

He’s startled by Valery’s voice behind him, hoarse from crying.

“I- I’m sorry I kicked you.”

Valery looks like he is about to cry again. He is dressed in his house clothes, and his puffy face makes him look younger, startlingly so, and so very vulnerable.

“Valera, no. _I’m_ the sorry one, I had no right...” Boris’ voice catches in his throat. “I scared you. Will you forgive me?”

“Of course. There isn’t anything to forgive. My Borya.”

“I love you to death, Valera.” He closes the distance between them, embracing his lover, but it all feels wrong. Valery’s body is somehow both limp and stiff in his arms, foreign, as if it doesn’t belong to him anymore, as if he no longer knows how to inhabit it.

Yet again, Boris has that strange feeling of observing himself from a distance. He is surprised at just how calm he is - his rage just a faint buzzing of a runaway bee colony locked in a beekeeper’s box.

The kettle starts whistling.

“Here. Tea is almost ready. Would you like some, Valera?”

Valery nods and sits down at the little table, looking lost - as if it isn’t his table or his kitchen at all. Boris pours water over the leaves and puts a towel over the teapot. “Ah!” he exclaims, reaching into the grocery bag for the box of “Napoleons”. He takes one pastry out and puts it on a saucer for Valery.

“Thank you.” Forcing out a smile, Valery leans over the pastry. He looks at it as if he has never seen such a thing before. Boris watches him, his heart breaking.

“I clocked him in the eye when he came onto me,” Valery says suddenly, looking up at Boris. “Split his eyebrow. Broke his glasses, too. I think.”

Boris crouches by Valery’s chair and hugs him by the waist. He takes his right hand into his, examines the little red marks on Valery’s knuckles and presses his lips to them. “You are the bravest man I have ever known,” he says, and goes on to kiss the bruises on Valery’s wrists.

“He got angry then. Really, really angry,” Valery says, quietly.

Boris pulls up a chair to sit as close to Valery as he can, envelops the younger man with both arms and listens, but Valery, still leaning over his pastry, is silent for a long time. Holding him close, Boris feels how Valery’s entire body is vibrating, wracked with tiny tremors.

“He had two of his men hold me down,” Valery says, barely audibly. Boris is trembling now, too, his face a silent grimace of terror. He leans even closer, hearing how Valery’s teeth are chattering with the effort not to cry. A few teardrops escape and fall on the powdered sugar, melting its surface into glassy circles.

“He made su-re it would rea-lly hurt, Bo-rya!” Valery cries out, choking out the words in tearful spasms.

“Oh God, oh God, oh God!!!” Boris jumps to his feet, pulling Valery, so heavy and limp, with him, crushing him in his arms. He buries his face into the nook between Valery’s neck and shoulder, stifling into it a beastly growl of pain, a wordless roar that keeps on spilling out of him. It takes every bit of whatever self-control Boris has left in him to prevent himself from disintegrating into pure feral fury.

Pressed into Boris’ large frame, caught up in the maelstrom of the older man’s anguish, Valery begins to weep into his shoulder in earnest. His sobs grow louder and louder, rapidly picking up strength, like a thunderstorm in summer. With shaking hands, Boris cradles the back of his lover’s head, rubs circles on his back, rocks his trembling, feverish body, holds him securely as if Valery might split right open from crying.

“My love… I am so, so sorry… Hold on to me… I’m here, Valera… I won’t let go... My sweetheart… I’ve got you… You’re safe, safe…” he speaks softly, weaving a thread of loving words for Valery to hold on to in the pitch blackness of his misery.

From time to time, Valery’s sobs seem to subside somewhat, only to be superseded by another anguished wail. Boris tightens his arms around him even further, nearly smothering the younger man in a desperate embrace. “My Valera… I’m so sorry... I’m here, _serden’ko moye… Sonechko moye..._ ” In his distress, Boris switches to Ukrainian.

Something about the terms of endearment uttered in Boris’ native language seems to comfort Valery enough that his sobs quiet down for good, giving way to loud, labored breathing. Boris wets a napkin under the faucet and gently wipes Valery’s face. Pours for him a full glass of cognac. “Drink it up now, quick.”

“That’s not how you drink cognac, Borya…” Valery says in a shaky, wet voice, as he slumps back into his seat.

A sense of relief washes over Boris. Valery being his argumentative self is the sweetest sound in the world.

“Look at him, he’s going to argue with me now,” he grumbles, good-naturedly. “Drink it to the bottom.”

Satisfied with the sight of the empty glass, Boris sits down next to Valery and cuts a small sliver of a “Napoleon” with a bread knife. Picks up the piece and brings it to Valery’s lips. Watches, with his arm around his lover’s shoulders, as Valery chews and swallows.

“Tasty?”

Valery nods.

Boris cuts off another piece and feeds it to him. Then another one.

“Thank you, Borya,” says Valery, picks up Boris’ hand and kisses it. There is powdered sugar on it, too.

Suddenly, he freezes, peering into space in front of him in wide-eyed terror. Boris follows his gaze in alarm.

“Borya,” chokes out Valery, his throat closing up. “He will come for me _again_.”

“Valera.” Boris tightens his grip around Valery’s shoulders, his eyes at once luminous with resolve. He reaches for a newspaper and writes in its margin in his sprawling, confident hand, as Valery watches:

“ _He will pay for this. I will take him down. We won’t win against the system, they will put another one in his place, but I will make sure that he_ \- Boris underlines the ‘he’ in an angry stroke, the tip of his pen tearing through the paper - _goes down. I promise you_.”

Valery’s eyes widen and he tries to say something, but Boris silently raises his hand. No.

Valery nods.

Boris tears the strip off the newspaper and methodically rips it to shreds.

(end of chapter 2)


	3. Chapter 3

Boris helps Valery into the bedroom. They stop at the foot of the bed, and the older man proceeds to carefully undress his lover down to his underwear as Valery looks over Boris’ shoulder at the thickening dark behind the window.

“Will you kiss me, Borya?” Valery asks hoarsely, his voice swelling with tears again.

“Of course! Here, let me…” Boris takes off Valery’s glasses and gently presses his lips to Valery’s. Valery’s response is surprisingly fierce. He grips the sides of Boris’ head, insistently deepening the kiss. Aching for the assurance that he is still desired.

 _Only when I am cold and in the ground will I stop desiring this little fool_ , thinks Boris, kissing Valery breathless, dipping him backwards in a lovers’ silent dance.

At last, breaking the kiss, he leans back and runs his hands down Valery’s shoulders and arms, carefully inspecting his lover’s body for more bruises. There are more purple marks on his shoulders and some around his hips. _He will pay... He will pay..._ goes on and on inside Boris' skull, like a drumbeat at the dawn of a battle.

“Valera, does it… Are you hurt? Would you let me... take care of you?” cautiously asks Boris.

Valery nods, silently. _Okay_.

“If you want to stop, tell me, yes?”

Valery nods again, shuffling his feet. Boris gently pulls Valery’s underwear down and nudges him to lie down on his belly, rubbing his lower back in circles to help him relax. He frowns. There is crumpled toilet tissue wedged between Valery’s buttocks. As Boris carefully pulls on it, he is forced to bite his lower lip to the point of pain, stifling a curse or, perhaps, an appeal to God, whose existence he has never given much credence to. The tissue has dried blood on it. Valery’s breathing grows louder.

“Sh-h-h. You’re okay. Okay,” Boris rubs his lower back again. “I wish you’d told me earlier. You were in there, crying... all alone..."

Boris' own voice quavers with a sudden rush of tears. He turns away, furiously rubbing his face as he rummages through the bedside table. "Here... just a bit of aloe jelly, okay? Just on the outside.”

Boris leans to plant a brief kiss on the beloved cluster of freckles on Valery’s sacrum, then helps him pull his underwear back on and roll on his back. He lies down by his side, wrapping his arms securely around his lover.

Sasha jumps on the bed and walks up Valery’s body, her green eyes wide, questioning. She sniffs all over his face, inspects it with her whiskers, alarmed by the fresh scent of anguish. The cat settles on Valery’s chest, purring and kneading his skin with her paws with such abandon that her entire body rocks to and fro. Valery chuckles faintly, stroking Sasha’s fur.

“So much love for such a small bed,” says Boris.

Boris remains with Valery until he is asleep, the glass of cognac working its merciful magic. He watches his lover for a while, listening to his quiet, steady breaths. Sasha is curled up next to them. Boris wishes he didn’t have to get up. He must. Quietly, he slips out of bed and leaves the room, closing the door behind him.

Boris takes the phone off the hook on the wall and carries it to Valery’s study, where he sits down at Valery’s cluttered desk for a while, surrounded by walls of books with titles so incomprehensible, that the only words he is certain of the meaning of, are prepositions.

He thinks of the decades of solitary, conscientious work that made Valery Valery - brilliant, awkward, fiercely honest, brave to the point of recklessness, so utterly vulnerable. Flooded with love and pain, Boris lowers his head until his burning forehead rests on the cool polished surface of the desk. “Valera, Valera, Valera,” he whispers. Clenches his fists. He would be fooling himself if he tried to deny that he was scared.

At last, Boris straightens in his seat, squares his shoulders, sighs, then dials. “Oleg,” he says in a hushed tone. “Late pickup, I’m afraid. Bring the shiny car. And stop by my office, grab the brown notebook from the bottom drawer. The old one.”

Thirty minutes later, Boris crosses the street and opens the door of the Seagull. “Gotta love that new car smell, eh, Boris Evdokimovich?” says Oleg. “Sure do, thank you, Oleg,” says Boris. He pats the cream-colored seats. “Better leather in this one, too. But this - he points to the car phone - is even better.”

 _Bring the shiny car._ This brand new Seagull is a spare. Hasn’t made it into KGB ledgers. _No one is listening._

Boris clenches the receiver in his fist, holding it like a cudgel.

“We can’t stay here,” he says, after a pause. “Attracted enough attention already. Drive, Oleg.”

It has rained earlier. The air is fresh and night-time Moscow sparkles like a box of gemstones. The big black bird flies through the sleeping city. From Volokolamskoe freeway it travels down Tverskaya, circles around the Kremlin, goes south down Bol’shaya Ordynka, takes the Garden Ring, crosses the Moskva River, follows down the embankment all the way to Sparrow Hills, goes on, and on, and on…

And as they go, telephone wires above them crackle with Boris’ measured vengeance. Somewhere in the city, phones are ringing, light comes on in windows, sleepy, startled people are raised from their beds, bleary-eyed from early sleep or from drunken stupor, squinting, stuttering, faced with unpleasant debts from their past, to be collected at last. They slouch and fidget and cringe and look ever so small as they stare into the frightening darkness behind the windows of their luxurious, high-ceilinged, government-issued apartments. Act or else.

Boris can’t fight the system, he knows full well that it will destroy both him and Valery, grind them up into dust at the feeblest of his attempts. He knows how it works. He nurtured it, faithfully provided for it, made it grow fat and strong and oh so big on a rich diet of Siberian oil and gas. But he can take down one man. It’s all just a circle of accountability, isn’t it? Nothing more. Nothing less.

Only when the first hues of dawn appear in the Eastern sky does the Seagull turn back.

Boris stays with Valery all weekend. Valery sleeps a lot. He wakes up tired, and for a brief moment - one that Boris tries his best to see him through - Valery’s still-waking brain does not yet _remember_. And then, in a flash, it does. He doesn’t say anything, and Boris doesn’t ask. All he can do is hold Valery through it, feeling the younger man's body tensing as the memory cruelly forces itself back into his consciousness. It will be a little better with each new morning, Boris hopes. A little better each time.

With some struggle, he makes Valery eat a breakfast of fried eggs and bread with butter and jam and lets him sleep until midday. They spend the remainder of the afternoon watching television, which Valery has not turned on for years - or so he says. Sasha, pleased with the warmth of the television set, lounges atop of it, swiping her tail across the screen.

After midnight, they go for walks together, like they used to do back in Pripyat’. For a moment, as they pass through a dark space between two buildings, away from street lights, away from curiosity that only means to harm, Boris feels a warm soft hand slipping into his. He gasps softly as he clutches it in response then lets go, his heart swelling with something that is entirely too beautiful, too big, too sad to be put into words.

The weekend passes in a heartbeat, and for the first time in ages, Boris decides to take Monday off. He uses Valery's phone to call his office, and gets briefed by one of his deputies. The young man jabbers like a maniac on the other end of the line.

"Boris Evdokimovich, have you heard the news?! The Deputy Director of the KGB was arrested last night! Misappropriation of government property in Dresden in 1967, they say! Some matter from twenty years ago has turned up, Boris Evdokimovich, can you believe it? Everyone here is saying that this is a sign that a major crackdown is starting, that there will be more arrests coming! Boris Evdokimovich, dear, will you be back tomorrow?"

Boris lowers the receiver, his attention suddenly drawn to a scene in the kitchen. It is early, but Valery is up and is standing by the window, a cup of tea in one hand and a half-eaten ''Napoleon'' in another. He takes a bite, raising a cloud of powdered sugar in the air, and it shimmers around his head in the young morning light. Sasha is weaving enthusiastic figure eights around Valery’s ankles.

Receiver still chattering faintly in his hand, Boris leans his shoulder on the door frame and smiles.


End file.
